the great chief foreign correspondent richard engel and his crew are free after being held captive in syria for five days. they were abducted by a group of gunman after they drove through what they thought was rebel controlled territory. they escaped during a fire fight and they safely reached turkey today. this morning on the "today" show engel described the kinds of things he and his crew were subjected to by their kidnappers. >> they kept us blindfolded, bound. we weren't physically beaten or tortured. it was a lot of psychological torture, threats of being killed. they made us choose which one of us would be shot first and when we refused, there were mock shootings. >> mock shootings. richard engel is back with us. he's one of the best reporters around the world regularly risking his life to report from war zones across the middle east. we're very happy he's safe and sound tonight, and we'll be right back. i always wait until the last minute. can i still ship a gift in time for christmas? yeah, sure you can. great. where's your gift? uh... whew. [ male announcer ] break from the holiday